Columbia Pacific "upgrade" to Columbia Commonwealth

A Columbia Pacific alumnus tells me he has just been offered the opportunity to 'upgrade' his Columbia Pacific doctorate to a "fully accredited by the Republic of Malawi" doctorate of Columbia Commonwealth University of Montana, for only $750 plus the writing of a 15-page paper.

Seems like a case of out of the frying pan into another frying pan, to me . . . unless, of course, CCU can provide the name of even one of the 3,000+ accredited colleges or universities in the US that would accept their degree.

 

I thought Les Carr was going to take things in the other direction. Montana, Malawi, it's all the same. (Don't tell my Montana-girl wife I said that.)

I'm very disappointed. For a long time I'd hoped CPU would prevail against the inept bureaucrats in California. I guess I'm too fond of the salad days when CPU was new and exciting (and nonformist, and avante garde, and....) To hell with it; they (BPPVE and CPU) deserve each other.

Rich Douglas

 

And they consider this to be a major step up from the Indian tribal accreditation in Fallon, NV (or wherever it was?)

Nice work, folks!

 

I thought that Columbia Pacific meant business when they announced that they were seeking accreditation from ministry of education of Republic of Malawi. It appears that Les Carr will continue to play the same old game over and over again.

Ike

 

This site gives you more information. http://www.altcpualumni.org/

------------------
Jonathan Liu
http://www.geocities.com/liu_jonathan/distance.html

 

Given CPU's recent actions, does anyone still question why the BPPVE revoked its approval?

 

With the new CCU offering to market its new doctorates to old CPU grads at $750 dollars and some work is greedy and in my opinion preying on its own alumni.

John

 

Zeesh!

As I think you pointed out the accreditation is not even from the Ministry of Education of Malawi. Prior to offering the sale I would think that they would have waited until this whole mission/link with Malawi were set up.

What is the 15 page paper for?? That is the length of an undergraduate paper.

Didn't someone say Greenwich did this in regards to their pre Norfolk Island degrees.
If so it would appear that jumping on the bandwagon at that point to upgrade would not have been a very wise choice.

North

[
QUOTE]Originally posted by John Bear:
A Columbia Pacific alumnus tells me he has just been offered the opportunity to 'upgrade' his Columbia Pacific doctorate to a "fully accredited by the Republic of Malawi" doctorate of Columbia Commonwealth University of Montana, for only $750 plus the writing of a 15-page paper.

Seems like a case of out of the frying pan into another frying pan, to me . . . unless, of course, CCU can provide the name of even one of the 3,000+ accredited colleges or universities in the US that would accept their degree.[/QUOTE]

 

North,

Speaking of the length of an undergraduate paper, I found an unpublished Master's Thesis on the web last nite. It has 1400 words and the graduate was not from Columbia Commonwealth, but from California Coast.

I was kinda shocked. Of course, quality's everything, but 1400 words, or roughly 6 pages, is kinda....

Byran

 

Just my experience, but the 2-year college I earned my A.S. from usually required 5-7 page research papers for a typical course. The 4-year college I earned my B.A. from usually required 10-15 pages, and my Master's program, 15-20 pages, with a high of 30-40 pages.

BTW, I *hate* minimum page numbers for papers, within reason. My opinion is that if you get your point across in 4 pages in a 5-7 page minimum, why should you have to bullshit another page that accomplishes nothing?

Bruce

P.S. I do agree that a 15 page paper for a doctorate is absurd, unless those pages contain the cure for cancer.

 

I have found throughout the years that dissertations for technical (science & engineering) fields tend to be quite short. It would not be unsual to have a Ph.D. diss in Physics not much more than 100 pages, etc. A friend of mine finished a Ph.D. in Engineering from Stanford with a total of 88 pages, bibliography, etc. included.

Anyone know the reason for the brevity?

EsqPhD

 

My experience has been that this is often an artifact of how the instructor decides to organize his/her class.

At various times I have been a biology, a philosophy & religion, and a humanities major. The biology courses rarely required papers at all. They had lots of lab practicals and short answer exams.

The phil and hum courses emphasized writing a lot more.

A rule of thumb at CSUDH-HUX was something like 10pp per unit. So a three-unit course would want 30 pages total. Normally that was divided up as the instructors saw fit. Two 15's, three 10's etc.

 

Scientists need to be able to scan journal articles quickly for information, so articles are written with brevity and simplicity to accommodate this need. Science dissertations are often written as a series of articles, in a style as close as possible to that of a professional journal to which the author will submit (or already has submitted) the article. Modern scientific journal publishers require brevity and economy of expression. Space can be saved in the Introduction and Discussion, for example, by citing previous articles that contain more extensive reviews. The results of a very lengthy experiment might be condensed to a few sentences describing the statistical analysis. A typical science dissertation contains three to five separate papers. If each article averages 30 pages (fairly typical manuscript length for submission to a journal, corresponding to perhaps 12-15 pages as typeset in the journal), the total length would be expected to be 100-200 pages, including a few general introductory and closing pages not part of the articles.

Non-science dissertations are often published as books instead of separate articles, allowing more flexibility for the total length.

Alex

 

Probabaly makes CCU's job of storing the degrees easier!

North

 

Bryan reported on a thesis: 'It has 1400 words and the graduate was not from Columbia Commonwealth, but from California Coast."

Yes, I read that. It was entitled "A analysis of the Battle of Gettysburg," and it went:

"The cannons were emplaced and the battle began: Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom . . ." (text abridged to save space)

 

Quite right, John! And each "boom" was cited and footnoted, so the footnotes alone comprised 72% of the total 1400 word thesis.
I thought you said those dissertations/theses were in a locked glass case at CCU. Now, I know why the owner said he was ashamed/embarrassed by them.

Russell

 

That should have read: Probably makes CCU's job of storing the dissertations easier.

At any rate, John's analysis of the dissertation says it all. We have a very concise & scholarly work which contributes much to the understanding of the war. What could his follow up doctoral dissertation possibly be?

North

 

The rifles raged, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam....

John

 

Hi Folks
A June 21/01 posting contained some very erroneous information about a degree upgrade program involving the former Columbia Pacific U and Columbia Commonwealth U. I have today received documents from CCU describing the program, have scanned them into PDF format, and have uploaded them to
www.altcpualumni.org/chronicles/CCUtransferdegreeprogram.pdf

The PDF document contains three pages:
(1) Curriculum Outline
(2) Intro Letter from Dr. Les Carr (CCU President)
(3) Today's email to me from Colin Hester, M.A., the CCU registrar.

The recent statement on CCU and a 15 page upgrade paper was bullshit - I don't know where the writer got it but it certainly was misinformed. I consulted with Les Carr on the development of this for some months (April - June) and the size tossed around was 50-100 pages with very specific requirements - nothing was implemented as the idea was in development, and alumni members were being consulted for opinions on the matter. I and many other CPU alumni would freak out publicly if such a thing involving 15 pages was implemented.

"CCU Transfer Degree Program"
Following are highlights.
(1) One year long
(2) Tuition approx $775.00 USF
(3) Requires minimun 50 page "addendum" to original thesis citing new developments in the research area, new literature, implications, etc. (+other guidelines)
(4) Requires a research proposal for a related future research project, including proposed methodology, possible results and conclusions, etc.
(5) Requires a summary of all learning activities since graduation from CPU
(6) Available only to graduates post June/97, when CPU lost approval via CA Administrative Court (now on its way to USA Federal Court).
(7) A different program will be developed for graduates pre-June 1997.
(8) Will only be made available upon graduate request

Regards,
Earon Kavanagh
Founder/webmaster www.altcpualumni.org

 

I don't know Earon. If CPU was legitimate to begin with, then I can't imagine why the "new" CCU would only allow partial credit of a CPU degree towards a "new" CCU degree. If CCU allows 114 CPU credits out of a possible...what...120 credits towards a Bachelor's degree, what are the 6 credits that CPU graduates are deficient in, and why?

Bruce